


and so we carry on

by skyqueenclarke



Series: life keeps turning [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Gen, Honestly you can read as bellarke if you want to, Post-Finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-14
Updated: 2015-03-14
Packaged: 2018-03-17 20:00:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3542039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skyqueenclarke/pseuds/skyqueenclarke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is how forgiveness goes.</p><p>or – six people that are waiting for Clarke to come home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and so we carry on

I. Bellamy

It takes a couple of hours for people to really notice it. The rescued are coming in and out of medical, and they keep hugging each other, too caught up in their freedom. Jasper sits by the side, still and quiet, and speaks to no one.  
  
It's Harper who asks first. She's smiling, truly, the way Octavia used to when she wanted another pony ride.  
  
"Where's Clarke? I wanted to thank her for everything," the words gets stuck in his throat and he's so thankful for Harper, that she understands, that she knows who she owes her life to.  
  
He hates Clarke, then, for leaving them. She's their princess and medic and leader and she's gone, left him without her once again, left him with the burden of hundreds of lives, left their precious delinquents in his incapable hands.  
  
(Bellamy knows war and rebellion and fighting, but what's the use of a rebel king for healing and understanding and comforting?)  
  
(The last time he comforted someone must have been Charlotte. Or maybe Fox, when he said she was safe. Well, look how well that turned out)  
  
"She left." he was going to sugarcoat it or give her reasons, but the words are out of his mouth before he knows it.  
  
Harper's smile dies, and she looks serious, like the soldier the mountain made of her. She doesn't look angry, and he's thankful.  
  
Monty comes to stand beside them, and he thinks about how he hugged Clarke, thinks how he's probably the only one who truly knows how much they owe that girl for making the choices no one else would.  
  
"She needed some time. I'm sure she'll be back when she's ready, or when we need her."  
  
_We need her now_ , Bellamy thinks. But it might just be him being selfish - he always needs her.  
  
Harper nods, serious – when she turns to him, her gaze softens, and she takes a deep breath.  
  
"She asked you to stay and watch over us, didn't she?"  
  
He doesn't know what to say to that. _I would have followed her to the ends of this earth if I could_ , he thinks of telling her, or maybe, _I need to look at you everyday to remind myself it was worth it_ , or even, _I would have given her anything she wanted but what she wants I can't give her._ __  
  
(She asked for a better idea, and he couldn't give her one)  
  
Harper doesn't care to hear it or maybe she already knows. She just sighs and looks beyond the gate.  
  
"I understand, I just wish she didn't have to be alone."  
  
Bellamy swallows at that, looks at where she stood just hours before, promising him it wasn't the end.  
  
He thinks of her tear-filled eyes and her lips on his skin. _I bear it so they don't have to_ , he remembers and doesn't hate her at all.

 

 

II. Miller

He sees Harper and Monty talking to Bellamy, sees them turn to the others - the whispers spread and within the hour everyone knows Clarke is gone.  
  
He's not sure what to think - Monty looks sad but at peace, Bellamy just looks tired, and Octavia doesn't look at anybody on the eye. Dr. Griffin comes out of medical, barely walking, and stares at the forest for almost a full minute before turning back without a word.  
  
"Good," his father says, and Miller turns to him, surprised. "One person can only be strong for so long without breaking. She needed time".  
  
Those words attracted some attention, several of the delinquents turning to his father in curiosity.  
  
"What exactly happened while we were gone?" Miller asks, and Monroe, who was sitting beside him, sighs deeply.  
  
"It's a long story" his father says, and starts.  
  
It’s the stuff of legends, and it starts with Clarke, covered in blood and mud, so much so, being dragged into camp because they taught she was a grounder. It starts with Clarke, waking up with her body covered in cuts and bruises, demanding plans and guns and anything else that would take to get them out of the mountain.  
  
They listen, quietly and seriously - by the time it reaches the part of Finn's actions and the grounder's call for his life, all the delinquents are near, even Jasper. When his father talks of Clarke, walking away from Finn's body with a bloodied knife and his kiss on her lips, Rebecca and Mark start crying.  
  
It's not a happy story. It ends with the commander turning away from Clarke, blood on her face, Lincoln being dragged away, their people abandoned.  
  
Monroe finishes the tale, her voice quiet and ashamed. "I told her we should go, that it was over. But she just stood there, in front of that gigantic door, and refused to give up".  
  
No one says anything, and Miller thinks of their princess, thinks how he told her she couldn't save everyone, how she turned from the ones she cared about the most and willed herself to let them burn.  
  
Miller is not a leader, and he doesn't want to be. But he's a soldier and he'll be what he needs to be, from Bellamy's second to Jasper's thief. To the girl who made herself their queen out of blood and sacrifice, he can only promise to spend his life repaying the things she did for them. Next time, he promises himself - because there'll be one, though he wishes he could pretend - he'll do everything in his powers to keep her hands clean, even if it means bathing his own in blood.

 

 

III. Abby

Jake asked her once, days before she betrayed him, if she hated him for the things he did for their people.  
  
(Part of him meant dying, because he knew they would float him for this. But mostly, he asked for putting their daughter in danger, allowing her to participate)  
  
_No_ , she told him - _no matter what,_ _I could never hate you._

 

 

IV. Raven

She wants to be angrier than she is. She wants to scream and yell, murderer and monster, how dare she leaves them, let go of the past, run for her ghosts? She killed Finn and Raven stayed, built her things, was her mechanic and perhaps, sometimes, even her friend.

But it takes too much energy to be that angry, and she’s tired and in pain.

What remains, from the mountain, are some undeniable facts: she was being drilled, and then she wasn’t. She was going to die, and then she wasn’t. And it’s in good part thanks to Clarke.

But than the first week turns into two, and two into three, and Raven starts getting really pissed off. She understands ghosts more than most, but if she could look Clarke in the eye after everything, then Clarke could damn well get over this and come home. 

The thing about Clarke, Raven thinks, it's that she has a way of getting under your skin, making you love her, making people follow her and do absurd things for her.  
  
Raven doesn't want to be one of those people, really, though she fears she already is. The boy who was everything to her loved Clarke Griffin and it made him a murderer and a corpse, and she can't forgive the girl for making Finn into someone she no longer recognized.  
  
She can't forgive Clarke for a lot of things. But--  
  
_I'd pick you first_ , she had said, a lifetime ago, and Raven hadn't really believed her. But Clarke went and killed and destroyed and did terrible things in the name of the people she loved, including her. And now that she’s gone, like those words meant nothing, even after she got Raven to need her and care for her.

She says so to Bellamy one day.

He was sitting a little ways from the other, staring at the fire – hard to see him without the kids these days, she’s pretty sure at least half of them just moved into his tent (well, the one he sleeps in now, which is actually Clarke’s tent).

She sits beside him, stretching her legs and just tells him she is angry, like the whole camp hadn’t been avoiding the subject of Clarke for weeks.

He stays quiet for a long time and it makes her feel even more justified in her anger. There was a time Bellamy Blake breathed and lived fire and she hates Clarke for changing him, making him a shadow.

(She's changed boys before)

He finally starts talking, though he doesn’t look at her.  
  
"The first time we saw acid fog, a boy named Atom got caught in it. He was as good as dead, but in a lot of pain. I kneeled beside him, with a knife on my hand, wondering how I was going to do it, end his pain. Then Clarke was there - told him she was going to help him, started humming a song, and then put that knife to his throat".  
  
Bellamy sits up straighter, holds his head high. Somewhere to her right, she hears Octavia draw a shaky breath.  
  
"It was the bravest thing I've ever seen. And then she killed Finn so he wouldn't be tortured. And made impossible choices so I wouldn't get caught in Mount Weather. And pulled the trigger on innocents so our people could live. Again and again, she did these brave, impossible things, drowning herself in blood so we could live, to the point she can’t look at us in the eye without remembering her sins. If what she needs to not hate herself is just some time and space, Raven, she can have as many years as she damn wants. We owe her that much".  
  
He stops, and sighs, and says no more. Raven can hear Octavia get up and leave to her own tent. She feels tears in her eyes, and brushes them away.

“I hate her”, she says and Bellamy smiles and she laughs, and it’s the saddest thing in the entire world, the two people who could hate this girl for a million reasons, and don’t know how to exist without her anymore.

 _Damn Clarke Griffin_ , Raven thinks, and loves her, and prays to the every star that she comes home soon.

 

 

V. Jasper

Bellamy punches him in the face.

Jasper is not stupid, no matter what people say, so he wouldn’t have said it if he had know Bellamy was near, but he hadn’t seen the older boy. As it where, he couldn’t help it, when Justin wondered out loud where Clarke was, to let the comment escape.

“I hope she’s as far away from here as possible” he muttered, and had barely finished the sentence when he felt Bellamy’s fist.

No one moves for a while, waiting for the next move. Bellamy breathes deeply, still as stone – it reminds Jasper of the only time someone dared point a gun at Clarke.

“I pulled that lever with her, so if you’re gonna hate her for saving your damn life, at least know that I have half the blame” he says, and signals some of the kids to help him up. 

For a moment, Jasper is ashamed of himself – he owes Bellamy Blake his life (but then again, he also owes it to Clarke) – but then he remembers Maya, burned and bleeding, dying in his arms.

“Then you should have gone with her” he spits, but Bellamy only nods and leaves. The other delinquents look like they want to say something, but don’t, just leave him there alone. Octavia is the only one who doesn’t shy away from him these days – the others forgave Clarke, if they ever hated her at all.

He hasn’t spoken to Monty in weeks.

He’s on guard duty when Harper comes – she sits next to him, gives him some water. He’s immediately suspicious, so he waits.

“Jasper, she knew it was probably gonna end like that. How could she not?” he stands up, because he won’t hear it, won’t and can’t, has escaped this conversation thousands of times before, but Harper holds his arm, and she’s a lot stronger than she looks. “There were 47 of us in that mountain, and 42 of us are still alive. That’s partly thanks to Maya, and we won’t forget it. But it’s also thanks to Clarke and Bellamy. So, I’m sorry, Jasper, but none of us were willing to die so your girlfriend could live”.

“There were other ways, I was going to kill Cage,” he hisses at her, because none of them understand, too ready to sacrifice the girl he loved.

“Like you were going to protect Fox?” she says, not unkindly, standing up too.

He hesitates and his anger crumbles. He and Harper stare at each other for several moments until she simply turns and leaves. He doesn’t move at all, until he feels another person next to him.

Monty doesn’t say anything, just stands by his side.

Jasper falls to the ground, crying and screaming, and Monty goes with him, holding his friend and holding back tears, even as Jasper pushes him away with so much strength it must hurt.

“What would you have done, Jas?” Monty whispers and Jaspers shakes his head, runs the answers through his mind – _take her away from there, give her bone marrow and run, take you and her and let the others be drilled, kill Cage, make all the soldiers vanish, save the day, die._

He thinks of Clarke, so long ago, holding their lives with the strength of her will, _thank you for not dying,_ and in Sargent Miller’s story, like a goddess that refused to abandon them, _you might be chancellor, but I’m in charge,_ and Finn, a gun, and 18 innocents, and wonders if he could become that person for someone he loved.

(The soldier was dragging himself on the floor and he put his axe on the man’s back; _Jasper, come back,_ Harper had screamed, but all he had seen was _mayamayamaya_ )

 _I won’t let you surrender,_ she had said, and he told her he loved her, and she said nothing back. She was so much braver than he was.

(The sudden realization, that, had Bellamy been on the dropship with Murphy, he might not have offered his life in exchange for Bellamy’s)

 _None of us is innocent,_ Maya said, and he least of all, he thinks, making promises he can’t keep, _I won’t let you die,_ and _They're not taking anyone else out of this room,_ and _We are ready for this._

And he hates, hates, hates her, but Jasper suddenly wishes Clarke were there, if only to tell him, in that princess way of hers, that he did everything he could.

 

  
  
VI. Octavia

Once upon a time, her mother had sat her down, while Bellamy slept peacefully, and told her: “Don’t ever apologize for your life, don’t ever make anyone make you feel guilty for the breaths you take”.

She carried that lesson her entire life, beneath the floor, trapped in a box, on the ground – _I’m not afraid_ , _I won’t be_ , _I’m here_ and _I deserve to be_.

Her brother tells her _she's dead because you're alive,_ and Octavia refuses to be ashamed, even if the words come from the person she loves most in the entire world. Octavia knows who she is, and she knows the value of a life more than most.

She makes lists for Clarke in the weeks that follow the rescue, things she wishes she could’ve said.

  1. _No life is disposable_
  2. _There’s no bravery in killing_
  3. _You’re a coward, running away_
  4. _You left my brother, you made him a murderer and left him to deal with it alone_
  5. _I saw them burn, all of them, gasping for air, Maya clung to me and cried_
  6. _It’s still not enough_



She goes through them before she sleeps, though she doesn’t dare say it aloud – the one time she does, to Lincoln, he looks at her seriously, and shakes his head.

“There’s no one in this world that cares as much as Clarke does, I think”, he says, and they don’t speak for days.

 _Why does she kill, then?,_ she thinks of asking. Thinks of going to Bellamy, grasping his arms, shaking him up, screaming _you’re a hero, you went into hell to save them and survived, you owe nothing to someone who named herself leader with no permission to do so._

She doesn’t, of course. Once, Bellamy and her only had each other, and he’s still everything to her, but Clarke Griffin stole half his soul, created a language just for them Octavia’s not allowed to learn. She resents her for that most of all.

(Octavia is not Sky People, she was never allowed to see the sky, and she’s not Tree People, so easily discarded, _you’re no longer my second_ \- she’s just Bellamy’s and she’s not enough for him anymore)

Sitting on the fire, she sees Raven approach Bellamy, hears him tell her about Atom, and her hearts breaks all over again, and she doesn’t understand anything. She goes to Lincoln that night, demands _explain,_ and, _show me what you see._

He tells her of Clarke, broken and angry, _you’re my people_ , and Lexa, desperate to protect this girl who was ready to burn the world to the ground, _did that make you feel better_ , and _no._ He tells her of his mother, the way she used to watch executions with the same expression Clarke had when she walked away from Finn with that knife, always muttering, _daun ste pleni._

“She doesn’t think lives are disposable, Octavia. She just makes the choices the others wouldn’t” – she thinks of that, wonders.

“She shouldn’t have trusted Lexa”, she says, because it always comes down to that, the choices Clarke made without consulting anyone, the ones she was so sure were right. 

“Maybe not”, he agrees. “But would that have made a difference?”

Would a missile still fall, would warning them cost her brother’s and the other’s lives? Would it have ended in any other way but her brother and Clarke, that room, and that lever?

“I don’t know”, she concedes. Lincoln looks at her with kind eyes, grasping her hands.

“So why do you judge the choices no one wanted to make?”

 _I could’ve made them and maybe better ones,_ she thinks, but knows she’s not allowed to say it aloud.

(Facts remain that she didn’t, that she fought and learned from Indra, but never stepped foot in a war council – no one invited her, truth, but they hadn’t invited Clarke either)

(Lincoln says _you don’t have to forgive her, but what’s the point of hating her,_ and what’s the point indeed?)

She goes to Bellamy, then. In the end, it comes down to him, always, their king they all look up to, follow and die for, but whose inspiration is golden hair and sky eyes - they’re all affected by her absence, but him most of all, she thinks, and hates Clarke all over again.

“Had it been you making the calls, and Clarke on that mountain, would you have warned them about the missile?” she hasn’t spoken properly to him in weeks about Clarke, a forbidden subject, so she can see the way his shoulders tense, how his chest freezes. 

 _No matter the answer, you’re still everything, Bell,_ she won’t allow herself to say, but hopes he knows anyway.

He opens his mouth, than closes it. Doesn’t know what to say. It’s answer enough.

“Why do you forgive her for leaving? You did it together” she whispers, and he breathes, softly, takes her face in his hands, and it makes her feel like crying.

“I feared that if she stayed, if I made her, it would get too hard, and she’d do something I truly couldn’t forgive”, and it’s a scary notion, Octavia thinks, that so many people she loves put their happiness on Clarke’s life, on her smile and love, on this girl that keeps pulling herself apart.

Her anger doesn’t fade that day, or even in the weeks that follow it. But she learns, demands stories from the other delinquents, about this girl they all adore as if she were the sun, things from the ground and before, from the word she was never allowed to be part of.

She learns _she’s a great artist; she was in solitary for a year; she wears her father’s clock; she’s awesome at drinking games; when they had to close the door on Bellamy and Finn, she could barely stand upright._

(From, Dr. Griffin, whispered one night, after more bottles of moonshine than Octavia could count, _I was the one who got her father killed, and I let her blame her best friend for it_ )

It’s her new list, things to make Clarke Griffin more human, to ease the memory of the _skaikru heda_ and remember someone who was something like a friend. It’s like one of Bellamy’s stories, she thinks, Athena, Pandora or Helen, like pulling apart the person they were and the person history remembers them to be.

From Lincoln, _if Lexa knew you knew about the missile, you should be dead now_ ; from Bellamy, _she told me I was not a monster and gave me the forgiveness I didn’t feel I deserve;_ and if nothing else, she owes Clarke a lot more than she likes to admit.

It helps explain, Bellamy’s devotion, Lincoln’s loyalty, Monty’s sadness and the delinquents’ love. Even Lexa, cold and hard as she was, had felt for this girl, and Octavia remembers the way Clarke had thrown herself in her brother’s arms _, I'm glad you're not dead_ , and understands a little. 

One day, a thousand stories later, she looks at one of Lincoln drawings, the tree line seen from camp, and says it aloud, without meaning to.

“It looks great - Clarke would have loved it”, Lincoln smiles, soft, Monty actually hugs her and she swears Bellamy tears up a little (idiot).

Lincoln gives her the drawing, and she looks around, everyone smashed together in the mess hall, escaping the cold. Jasper and Monty are three tables apart, but it used to be six; Bellamy is arguing with Kane, like usual; Megan and Harper are laughing at something Jackson is telling them; and there’s a group of delinquents playing with the cards Raven made, loudly arguing with each other.

Octavia looks out, beyond the gate, wonders about Polis and the mountain, wonders if anybody buried the dead, if Clarke’s cold, hungry or missing them.

She folds the drawing delicately, making a note to herself to keep it on her tent – at least for now, she’ll keep it safe.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Translations first! 
> 
> daun ste pleni = that is enough
> 
> skaikru heda = commander of the sky people
> 
> \--
> 
> Okay, I've never written for this fandom (I had to create this account just for this fic, actually), but, honestly, that ending was everything. I know it kind of sounds like everyone just loves and forgives Clarke, which might not be how the show goes, but I love and forgive Clarke, so as far as I'm concerned, everyone should. 
> 
> You can follow me on tumblr if you'd like, though I should warn you that fic-writting is not really a thing I usually do! - skyqueenclarke.tumblr.com
> 
> Oh, also, the random delinquents' names, I got from wikipedia, some of the names it says you could read on the control panel on the Ark. I just needed it to not feel like the remaining 100 were just Harper, Miller, Monty and Jasper.


End file.
